Attack of the Final Girls is a podcast about the horror genre so listener discretion is advised. Please check the show notes for specific content warnings for this episode. And of course, beware of spoilers. Welcome to Attack of the Final Girls. I'm Juliet. And I'm Teresa. And we are here freshly off of watching today's movie. Eraserhead 1977 David Lynch classic RIP David Lynch. That is why we're doing this. Some people say this is not a horror film.
I would say it is a horror film, depending on what you're looking at. Sometimes it is classified as fantasy, science fiction, horror. drama and to that I say yes is it a movie is it real life is this but a dream that we had you know simultaneously And we've just woken up from it. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. What is a movie? Let's start there. What is a film? What is cinema? What is cinema? Who are we in the larger scheme of things? All questions I feel we're forced to at least ponder, if not answer.
Yeah, this is the first time I've ever watched Eraserhead. Right. Yes. So if I'm sounding calmer, it's because I've seen this movie before. Am I dissociating? I was not. Do I need to go spend some time alone? after this movie? The answer is yes and. No, like I'm no stranger to David Lynch work. You know, I've probably have the record for watching Mulholland Drive out of all of my friends because I watched it and then I made everybody else watch it. Yeah. Just to see like.
what their reactions were. Blue Velvet, of course, Twin Peaks, which was my first foray into David Lynch. So I've seen a lot, like definitely not like I've never seen Inland Empire. I've never seen Lost Highway, although I do jam to that soundtrack quite a bit. Wild at Heart. No, I've never seen Wild at Heart, which I desperately want to see that Wild at Heart because I love Laura Dern and Nick Cage. Yeah. But it's not on streaming anywhere. Yeah. And of course, it's like sold out forever.
Esquire in Cincinnati is actually doing for Valentine's Day. They had one showing last night and then they had because of the overwhelming demand. They had actually booked it prior to David Lynch's death. When that happened, of course, there's like a huge surge in people wanting to see the movie. So they're doing a second showing also sold out on Sunday, which is disappointing because I did definitely want to see it.
Good for the Esquire. Yeah, exactly. Because definitely a movie worth watching and also totally appropriate for Valentine's Day weekend. Yeah, absolutely. But this is... This is not those films. No, it's not. No, no. This was David Lynch's first feature length film. It was technically a student film when he was attending the American Film Institute.
What I love about this film is that it is... a student film and it is a first feature from an auteur so you can see the mechanics behind it too not in a way that I think distracts from the movie you know this is
Not backyard cinema. And this is at a higher, much higher level than I would say, you know, the average student film is. But I love... to see the kind of mechanics and knowing the circumstances under which he made this movie, to see the innovation there and to see how he was able to execute this.
wonderful, surreal vision that he had for this movie, knowing that he was on a student budget, a very small budget, in fact, and had a lot of budget issues and was really making this you know, flying by the seat of his pants resource wise, but still executed an amazing vision. So that is one of the things I appreciate, I think, about David Lynch the most is that he is so deliberate. Yes. Like if you could say.
anything about David Lynch's movies, hate him, love him, love his work, hate his work, hate what he has to say about his work, hate the hype around his films and his TV work, you can say... Above all else, he is very deliberate in the way that he produces art. There are lots of folks who don't like his movies. There are lots of folks who like some movies and not others, which is totally fine. Everybody has their own taste.
But I think that the most important trait that David Lynch had is he only specifically deliberately made movies that he wanted to make. Absolutely. Even my mom and... dad used to say he would cut off his nose to spite his face. And I think that David Lynch would do that so that he could make a movie that he wanted to make so that it looked and felt and...
appeared and gave the impact that he wanted. Even if it wasn't popular at the time or, you know, visually stunning or it wasn't winning awards or it wasn't getting him production money.
He still did it deliberately. I would agree. And to continue to speak to that intention, I think David Lynch as a person and as an artist relating to his art is... I think, somebody to really be admired because he has always owned everything that he has done despite its flaws, despite... uh works having uh things that you know were appropriate that at the time that they were made may not be appropriate for modern day you know and he has really you know
acknowledged the journey, you know, the progression of not just his art, but the world in which his art takes place, the world that surrounds and contextualizes his art. And he really up to his death, even with... these wonderful intentional kind of, you know, things he was doing on social media, I think was really... Saying like, I am an artist in the world and I'm going to continue to grow with and respond to.
the world around me. And not to be ashamed of what I've done in the past, but that was one part of my and the world's journey, and we are all continuing to grow together. So that's something I've really admired just about observing him. within the artistic world as well. Yeah, the way that he discusses his art is so fascinating to me, like watching him in interviews.
And the fact that he sometimes will engage and sometimes will give you like these little snippets of where his mind was when he was making a certain thing. And other times he says, no. I refuse. Yeah, exactly. Which is fascinating in a world where we expect that.
Directors will open themselves up. Writers will open themselves up every single time they make a movie and tell us exactly ABCD. Here's how my movie connects. Here's what I was feeling. And like, great. That's awesome. If we can get that sort of insight, that's great. But especially around Eraserhead, David Lynch would kind of refuse to talk about it. He said, I don't need to tell you what it's about. Watch the movie. It's a film. Like, watch it. Feel it. Experience that movie.
That's it. There's nothing else that I need to talk to you about when it comes to that movie. One of my favorite lines of David Lynch is when he was like, God is gay. And they were like, elaborate on that. He said, no. And I'm just like, what a power move, you know, for him to say like, no, I don't want to tell you more about that. I don't need to tell you more about my movie. Watch my movie.
That's it. That's all that you need to know. Well, I think like the God is gay statement is a perfect example of. him saying I'm not saying this to necessarily shock or titillate you which is I would say the same thing about Eraserhead like this does not exist to shock or titillate you
But boy, oh boy, are you going to be thinking about this for days and weeks to come? However that hits you, whether you love it or hate it or don't understand it or find deeper meaning, it's going to sit with you. And good art does that. One of the other beautiful things I think about David Lynch is that he did not aim to make... movies that were only for artists and also like movies that were meant to stump you like David Lynch
said himself, he's a simple guy from Montana. He was born in Missoula, Montana, which is basically the middle of nowhere.
I've actually read some of his lifestyle choices. He ate the exact same thing every day. And it was on purpose, intentional, so that he could... devote the rest of his brainpower towards creation but he wasn't the type of person that was like oh you don't get my movies forget you you know he was an everyman and i think that is reflected in his a lot of his films not all of them because some of them are you know
little different, but a lot of his films and also I think Twin Peaks center around the everyman or people who maybe have been disadvantaged or live on the outskirts of society specifically so that... more people can relate to them.
And I don't ever think he held it over anybody else's head. I think that there are a lot of auteur directors that are kind of like, fuck you if you don't understand, you know. And I don't think that David Lynch, that's sort of like the beautiful thing about him is that not only.
was he intentional with the way that he made movies he also was like oh you don't get it that's okay it's not for everybody to get yeah exactly but you're not less for not getting it like try something else because I have this vast body of work And everything is frigging different. Yeah. It's so different. That's like one thing I hate about directors is like, oh, if you don't get it, then like whatever. And there are lots of people, especially like film students and people who review movies.
And I love that. Well, and talking about the everyman, that is a theme we see in most of his work manifesting in different ways in different works. I think to sort of center this in Eraserhead. So we've got this main character, Henry, who is...
The everyman. And that is one of the very few grounding factors in this movie. Like there is so much in this movie that is bizarre or unsettling or... just off kilter enough to make you very uncomfortable in a way that it's hard to kind of put a finger on. But our main character, Henry, is an everyman, a flawed everyman. Granted, with an iconic look, you know, again, with a look that's a little off kilter.
And what I love about that, and we see this again manifest in Lynch's work, is that when we're talking everyman, he really tends to take like post-World War II Americana. and subvert it. In this movie, it's very twisted up and subverted. In things like Twin Peaks, I think we get a slightly off-kilter version of... the sort of trappings of 1950s Americana. But I think that that is something that is so interesting.
In contrast to the media of that time that was portraying this very like squeaky clean image of American suburban post-war life, he's peeling it back and saying, Yeah, okay, that's the image we were portraying. But around every corner, there was a dark side or a sublime side or a surreal side or a twisted side. Yeah, exactly. I think Henry is a strange
perpetually concerned every man. He has this look on his face at all times where he's kind of like, I don't understand what's going on, but I'm very fixated on trying to figure it out. And the actor that plays Henry, Jack Nance, he actually went on to play Pete in Twin Peaks. And he has a very similar look. I was kind of thinking about it as we were watching. I was like, maybe if Henry existed and...
like was able to persevere, he would eventually end up being Pete in Twin Peaks. Yeah. Like sort of weird. He says some weird stuff. He's got this weird look on his face, but like nothing really bothers him that much, you know, like fish coffee, whatever. Yeah, I don't care. But yeah, he is portraying this sort of like post industrial, post nuclear, at least we're, you know, allowed to assume that the photo on his wall, like grimy. crusty part of the country, this guy who's working a job that...
ostensibly doesn't pay very well. He has like one set of clothes. He has a very small one room apartment. He has a girlfriend who is also perpetually upset about her circumstances. He's not rich. And he walks everywhere. Like there's no cars in this. We hear trains a lot, but that's it. So we're kind of like stuck in this very bleak, dismal black and white reality, which I love that too. The fact that this movie is in black.
and white almost as an ongoing theme, like things are black and white, but in this particular existence around him, they're not black and white. They're very much not black and white. So I love that. I love that we're brought into this very surreal. situation with a guy who, you know, you could know this could be your uncle or your dad or your grandpa, but he is thrown into this world or at least perceives himself to be in this world that's very different.
And weird and gross at times. And he's just trying to piece it all together. And he's just going through the motions, you know, squishing weird worms and watching the lady in the radiator. And I think that is, you know, the thing about Henry is the lines between his surreal reality and even more surreal dreams are very blurry.
You know, we find ourselves as viewers, and I think that's something that people struggle with with this movie and with other pieces of David Lynch's work, where we don't always know.
from the start of a scene, whether something is real life or a dream or a hallucination or something else. And those blurred lines... serve as a way to get into the characters' heads, you know, to sort of understand more about who they are and their sort of state and the state of the world that they live in, that there are these sort of very liminal spaces between reality and...
dream or fantasy that is a through line that he plays with in a lot of his work like all the way through until the end of his life david lynch i mean Mulholland Drive is the one that comes to mind most readily, but there's a movie entirely about what is real and what is so real. Does it matter? Do the real and the surreal matter? Do dreams matter? Or is this a situation where we just have to accept what's happening and not bother ourselves with?
trying to separate those things, at least not too hard, because you're really thrown one, you know, Like, okay, this is reality. Yes, Henry has a strange baby ET child that his wife has had after, you know, a sexual experience with her.
Even though it's only been a couple of weeks. Yeah. Well, he doesn't say a couple of weeks. It's been a shorter period of time than you would assume that there would be a baby. Right. So like, is this child real? Is this a manifestation of his inner child that he's not able to? you know, satisfy during this time? What exactly is the through line of the story?
He exists in dreams. He exists outside of himself when he actually becomes an eraser. You know, what about... this situation in considering this is also post-industrial and a little bit fantasy we don't know how the world works either. Absolutely. That is, I think, something very important to remember and something that I know that filmgoers get frustrated about. There's sort of kind of two camps when you're talking about fantasy, science fiction, surrealism.
One camp is you are thrown into the world and you're thrown in at whatever point in the story you're thrown into. And maybe you understand the rules of the world. Maybe you don't. The other camp is the more, I'll say he didn't invent this, but he's the best example, the more Tolkien-esque example, where... You are set into a world and very quickly time is spent orienting you. You know, you are made to understand.
the place and the people and the creatures and the kind of rules at play and the rules of the magic or the whatever, you know, and so you understand those boundaries very, very quickly. I happen to like both camps and appreciate them, but I... know for some filmgoers the absence of the rules drives them crazy like they just can't deal with like not having the rules of the world spelled out I know other filmgoers who find the Tolkien model very
restrictive and kind of pandering like oh I don't need all this information. It's kind of an interesting thought experiment. I think that people who have trouble with movies like Eraserhead might need that more spelled out. thing you know and we get that in horror too you know there's the movies where we know exactly who the killer was why they're killing what's going to stop them and there are movies where the killer just kills
And we're along for the ride. And maybe we know why. And maybe we never do. I was thinking a lot while we were watching this about Possession, which is probably one of the movies that is... Closer in terms of narrative style to this movie than a lot of other movies that we watch. Because horror does have a tendency, like lower budget horror has a tendency to be more surreal.
As where like more higher budget or mass produced horror has a tendency to be more of that Tolkien, you know, structure, not exclusively, but a lot of times, sometimes it can be very formulaic. Especially with slasher movies, it can be very formulaic. So I was thinking about sort of that surreal, what is a dream? What is not a dream? What actually happened? Who is the reliable narrator here in the film?
possession when we were watching this movie although possession is i would say much more serious in tone yeah um not to say this movie is not serious but there's a lot more levity and absurdity i think in this film than we see in possession. But David Lynch is not afraid to play fast and loose with those rules.
And the funny thing about this movie is that if you watched it and you do nothing about David Lynch or the production of this film or anything like that, you might think, oh, this is a movie that was pieced together from several different...
you know, vignettes that this person made and then they kind of put them together. Well, if you know about the actual production of this movie, it took five years for him to actually make this movie. He started it when he was in art school and then had funding issues.
issues situations where they had to tear down sets and then rebuild them jack nance actually ages quite a bit during the course of this movie and i just find that fascinating that it took so long not just because of the production issues
but for him to put the pieces of this movie together in a way that made him happy and it was something that he wanted to release. Yeah, absolutely. And to your point about, you know, sort of... serious or not i i think what i love about this movie is that by reputation you would think it is a very very serious film and certainly the beginning of it leads you to believe that it's very very serious
But I find there's a bit of whimsy throughout. Like they could have done so many things with the baby. I find the baby like. In my own sick twisted way, like hysterical, like it's such an interesting little creature, you know, and they could have gone with a more near realistic look for the baby that would have, I think.
pulled at people's heartstrings in a different way, you know, that would have really said, oh my God, this is an ill child, you know, and these people are seemingly not caring for it or whatever. But the choices that they made to make it this... weird lizard bird kind of creature infuses a little bit of whimsy and I think also allows us to not get like so mired in the like
oh my God, these people are abusing this child. They're bad parents. You know, like, because that's not, people have different reads on this film, but I don't think that's the point of this film. Yeah. You know.
Yeah, no. And that's kind of where I was sort of letting it ride because to me, the puppet is semi-disturbing. One of the wildest things to me is that the baby puppet is made out of a partially... preserved cattle fetus yeah but the eyes move and it was freaking me out i was like this is like the eyes are way too good i don't understand i don't like it
It's like, is this a real child or is this a message? Is this a theme that we're supposed to be looking at? Because they do neglect this child. I mean... Mary, the mother of this child, runs away. Like she basically is there for maybe a couple of nights and then she's kind of like, I'm going back to my parents.
And she leaves Henry with this baby, which has never been named. It does not have a name. It can't speak. It chills on the dresser. And like coos a little bit sometimes and cries and then gets very ill. And Henry doesn't know how to take him.
of a baby like he's kind of like what is going on and then eventually you know that leads to his child's death or whatever it is is this like his childhood is this him inside you know whatever it is he kills it intentionally or other well I mean eventually intentionally but yeah it's strange how that creature can strike people differently yeah
Because I was like, God, those eyes are just teasing me out, man. I literally wrote, the baby puppet with the moving eyes is too much. And see, I have a different reaction. I can't remember what I thought of it the first time I saw this movie, but I just find it... delightful in a very twisted way you know i'm just like oh look at the little creature you know like he's neat he is and you come to kind of be like oh it's kind of cute it makes like little cooing noises
It doesn't scream all the time. The entire first 10 minutes of this movie, there is no dialogue. It's just following Henry sort of through his world. Like he's going to... work or he ostensibly he's coming home from work And he's just sort of chilling in his room with this weird radiator that he has. And then he hears from his or across the hallway neighbor that Mary has called and invited him over to dinner.
And he's like, that's weird. Stop coming around. I don't know what happened. And finally, we get that dialogue of him talking to his neighbor. That's the first time that we hear speech within the entire movie. We have to sit with Henry's reality. with just sound effects. There's not really music per se in the movie. There is a song in the movie, but there's not really music. There's no...
composition, I would say, in terms of music, it's more sound effects. Yeah, and ambient sound. And ambient sound. So that is something... That is very noted about this one. It's one of the things I love about it is that there is ambient kind of drone music under most of the scenes, but it's so droney and so ambient. don't always actively notice it's there. Like it's not like a score swelling up. It's just this kind of persistent like hum under scenes that really gives us that.
industrial feel too. And that unsettling feel. Yeah, absolutely. The other sort of noted thing about this movie is with it being David Lynch's first feature, he uses what's called diegetic music, which he would use for his entire film career. That is where you have music in a scene and the character is experiencing the music with the audience. So that would be like the radiator woman singing. Henry is...
witnessing her singing along with us. It's for the character's benefit as well as the audience's benefit. A good example of non-diegetic music is Gonna Fly Now in Rocky. Rocky is not hearing that song during the montage. when he's running up the steps bummer
That is strictly for the benefit of us, the audience member, to get us pumped up and get us feeling, you know, what Rocky is feeling. Now it would be. Now he would have Bluetooth headphones. Oh, he totally would. Yes. Absolutely. Yeah. Just like, yeah, yeah. Yeah. At the top of the steps. Everybody's like, what the hell? What is that guy doing? He's getting pumped.
There is one other song I just thought about. It's when he comes home and he puts on the record player. Exactly. We're hearing that diegetically as well. Another thing I found in the trivia that I thought was really interesting is that when he first was screening this movie.
You know, he's screening it as an art student. He's screening it as like a brand new director. So you're going to have like, you know, two handfuls worth of people that are going to be there. And that's it. He had tracked the sound like way too loud. People were like, whoa, I can't do it. Now, that is one thing I find very fascinating about David Lynch's work is that he is very deliberate.
about everything in his movie, up to and including the sound. Absolutely, yes. We see that in Twin Peaks. Now, Twin Peaks is a little bit more cornball, I would say. Not to say that Twin Peaks isn't a serious... piece of work yeah but the music and only using a couple of different tracks is like kind of corny you know he's got like the weird gumshoe like snappy music and then he's got like the sadder swelling crescendo
music, like when they find Laura Palmer's body and stuff. So I find this movie so interesting and so specifically unsettling. The example I wrote down is when Henry goes to dinner with Mary and her family. So we have this sort of like swelling industrial music, you hear the train come through sometimes to the point where it starts to obscure the dialogue that's happening. And that train sound is swelling and that ambient noise is also swelling.
And we have this scene with the tiny chickens. Oh, yes. The Cornish hens. Yes. So he's like, it's new and they're no bigger than your fist. And these... Chickens are bleeding and the mom is having this upset fit. And then her daughter runs into the kitchen with her. And, you know, the dad is like just smiling. It's very weird. And Henry's like, should I cut the thing?
I don't know, like this absurdly giant knife and this cutting fork. And I don't know if I should do it because there's bleeding and bleeding and bleeding and I don't like it. And then all the sound cuts off. Yeah. All at once. And it kind of gives you this break. And you're like, oh, shit. I didn't realize how keyed up I was from this scene and how, like, off it throws you. Yeah. I think that that entire scene of him going to visit.
the parents is like very off-putting that set specifically was built for the movie. And the way that it is built, it is like very unforgiving. And I think the entire scene is just very off-putting. Yeah. There is a lot happening in that scene. So you've got...
Mary's dad up against Henry Henry as we have said is very he's like trying to embody the very like traditional like post-war World War II American male stereotype and he's failing epically at that you know we see this like you know veneer of like trying to be like the everyman but just turmoil behind his eyes at all times
up against mary's dad who's just like yeah i'm a plumber who does not yeah he just like is unbothered by everything in a very traditional like i am a man i work a job my knees hurt i am unconcerned about everything
The women in my life, they're doing lady stuff. I don't know. Look at these small chickens. You know, very like literal. And then you've got the two women in the scene who are like... embodying sort of this like archetypal view of like female hysteria almost but also is it hysteria or is it a metaphor for orgasm dude i thought that exact thing while i was watching this like so mary has a fit and then her mom like brushes her hair and then she calms down henry does not seem to notice or like
you know, even he's not bothered by that at all. And then when Henry is about to cut into the tiny chicken, her mom starts to like have this like moaning. situation where eventually she starts crying at first it's very definitely rooted in pleasure and then she starts crying runs out of the room her daughter mary runs after her
And then immediately afterwards, she's like, I need to talk to you, Henry. Pulls him aside and then starts asking him if he's had sex with Mary. Then she starts kissing his neck. Yeah. Which is very weird. It's like a very strange heel turn towards... like this weird sexual urge that she has towards this guy who has ostensibly given her daughter a strange baby. It's also like every woman that Henry comes into contact with.
ends up having sex with him yes or at least attempting to not his not her mom right but she does try until mary comes around the corner she's like mom don't it's like that's weird that's a weird thing yeah nobody does that yeah That is also sort of a Lynchian thing is strange sexual urges and people just plowing through with them, like no inhibitions, just like, I'm going to do the weird thing. Yeah, I'm going to do that.
acting like strictly from their id yes yes i think full id i think that he does a lot of stuff that's like that i mean If you think about Blue Velvet, I mean, Dennis Hopper basically is id, you know, like very much so. Kyle MacLachlan, I would say, like, is sort of like... He's warring with his id at all times. Like he has this facade of being like the good Agent Dale Cooper. But behind it, he is like very much compelled by that same id because he says weird stuff all the time. Oh, yeah.
And he's just like, everything is pleasure and I am just going to do the thing that makes me feel good. Specifically, Henry does not ever seem to... find pleasure in anything in his relationship with Mary. He's very uncomfortable when her mom starts kissing on him. He Has sex with his across the hall neighbor, but he doesn't seem to find pleasure in that either. Yeah. He's sad that she.
I got the impression that she was maybe like an escort or, you know, had lots of dates in that regard. But he seems to be like very upset by that. But yeah, it's strange. Like characters in these movies, in David Lynch's work, just have a tendency to just like roll with it. Yeah. They're just like, I don't have any inhibitions. Like there's no rules in this world to tell me not to do that thing. Well, exactly. Yeah. Yeah.
And people will accept it. Yeah. And this world, especially, we don't even know the rules of this world. Not only do we not know the rules of this film, we also don't know the rules of the world. Is this a strange faux pas? Because we don't see any other characters. We don't have any idea. Right. This could be perfectly normal behavior. Yeah. I mean, it looks like Henry's uncomfortable, but maybe he's the only one because the dad doesn't seem to care. Yeah. So.
It's wild. We just don't know. We have no idea what this society is like. And although there's reflections of sort of this post-industrial, like poorer area, we have no idea outside of that. I mean... They're having strange babies that maybe are, you know, there are issues there. Like maybe this is not uncommon. Right. Yeah. We don't know. Yeah. We have no idea. Yeah.
fascinating to think about the broader world, because I mean, we always as humans, when we watch a movie, we try to tie it back down to our own life and the society and existence that we live in. But sometimes maybe you can't do that. To a movie. We can't relate to Henry. We can't relate to Mary because we don't know what their world is like. Right. We have no idea where they even are. Yes, exactly. Like it's supposed to be, I guess.
At a certain point in time, Lynch and his family lived in Philadelphia, and they lived in a very bad part of Philadelphia. So he said that this is sort of a reflection of that. And his daughter has hypothesized that... This movie is a reflection of her being born because his daughter was born with club feet and required a lot of surgery to recover from that when when she was young. So she thinks that this movie she was born in 1968. She thinks that this movie.
movie is david lynch trying to cope with her disability when she was born and like that's kind of what she sees in the movie He literally wouldn't talk about it. So we have no idea if that's true or not. Yeah. The one thing he said is that this is his most spiritual film. So take that, you know, however you want. Damn. Okay. I mean.
I mean, that adds a whole extra layer to it because, I mean, who knows? Who knows if he means that, like, literally this movie is what he finds to be spiritual or maybe if he was just in a spiritual... Exactly. You know, phase in his life. And that's why he feels like this one is his most spiritual. So non literal. Yeah. And I think that that is so cool. Yeah, I love it.
Even if you hate his movies, the one thing that you can say about David Lynch is that he's deliberate and he meant every single thing. It doesn't matter what it is. One of the other weird things that I want to mention about this movie and something that is...
pretty much entirely overlooked. We never really get any reference to it. The weird mounds of like mulch and earth that exist within Henry's... apartment so when he comes home the first time we get kind of a close-up of his radiator and there's like earth and mulch and moss at least what it looks like around the radiator. And then later we see that there's also that same mulch and moss on top of his like bureau of drawers. And also he has like this random...
dead, maybe just dormant tree that's on his nightstand with just a pile of earth. What the hell? Yeah. Is that the consequence of some kind of nuclear fallout? Is that symbolic in some way? We don't know. We get to decide as viewers, which is, you know, that is the thing. Like when a director refuses to.
explain or let us in it becomes our responsibility to figure it out and I think that's where people get frustrated is like they're like but I want to be entertained you know I don't want to work I don't want work but we are meant to do the work to figure that out and I don't know what that means that's one of the things in this movie that I'm still I was looking at that as we were watching it I was like
Still haven't kind of nailed down what I think that means. And later when Henry is watching, when he becomes a part of the performance of the girl in the radiator, there is like a tree that gets rolled out on the little, you know. It's obviously a tie back to the tree that's on his nightstand, but it's like, what the hell? What does this mean? We have no idea. Why is the woman in his radiator? You know, what about his radiator makes him see this woman?
You know, is this a fantasy? Does she really exist there? Is this like their alternative to a television? Because they don't have TVs. We don't ever see a TV in the movie. It's weird. As we were watching that, I was like, are we supposed to be paying attention to this? But it's one of those things where like, I can't help but to pay attention because it feels very deliberate.
It could just be dusty or dirty, but no, there's like mounds of earth around, which seems deliberate. Oh, yeah. And we don't see outside of Henry walking to and from his building. We don't ever see any other. Signs of like foliage or life. No. Just like muddy, dirty clumps. And yeah, it's wild. It's a lot. Maybe this is their way of like... bringing the outside inside like we keep plants sure they're just like let's
You know, throw some dirt on it. Maybe they can't grow anything because the way I took Mary's dad talking about the chickens is that he said that they're manmade. Yes. So I took that to mean that we live in this post nuclear society where food has to be grown or. generated rather than like bread that makes perfect sense yeah um so maybe this is like they're like well nothing grows so let's just have like clumps of dirt with no pot just on the floor i guess
Who needs pots? Yeah, right? That's an expense we can't, we cannot spare. So the girl in the radiator, I think... For me, anyways, she was giving A Trip to the Moon. Absolutely. Like her face sort of reminded me of the moon from A Trip to the Moon. Totally. I think that movie came out in 1902, the short film, one of the most early.
short films because her cheeks are very large and they're not meant to be realistic right they're very obviously not realistic that's sort of what it made me think of very strange I love that homage though yeah I also was struck when we were watching the scene where he's going up in the elevator to Mary's house and then also watching the girl in the radiator.
David Lynch is a sucker for a draped curtain and a patterned floor. Oh, yes. He was just like, look, I'm a slut for a patterned floor. Like, give me some zigzag patterns. Give me a checked pattern. Give me a. Yeah. Yeah, a chevron. Give me a draped curtain. Like, I'm there. I'm here for it. Yeah. Like, it's cool, though. I mean, it looks visually very cool. Yeah, it's very striking. Like, you can't tell me that the Black Lodge...
in Twin Peaks aren't like among the most iconic. Of course. Yeah. Like that's what people think of. Oh, yeah. Anytime you say David Lynch, I mean, the image that comes to most people's minds is red velvet curtains. and some kind of patterned floor. Yeah. Period. Yeah. Maybe he just loved velvet.
You know, in general, the blue velvet. I wrote that down in my notes. I was like, he is just a sucker for a draped curtain and a patterned floor. But like, good for him. He knows what he likes. Yeah. He's like, this makes me feel some type of way.
And I would like to have it in all of my movies. I did want to say that at the point when Henry's had kind of... pops off yeah and then his like a vision of his son or maybe his inner child whatever it is sort of pops out they made henry's head look really good they did it was a very good fake yes so filmmaking wise like
Oh, yeah. Good job. Yeah. Another sort of Lynchian thing is there's that moment when the camera sort of comes out of the kitchen of Mary's house and then through the living room and then into like the blinds, like between the flats and the blinds and it goes black. He loves. that too, that is
Something that you see in a lot of his movies, sort of that like shaky cam, like point of view surrealist thing. I like that. Yeah. And the blinds thing specifically, I wonder if that was either a deliberate or unconscious. Hitchcock nod just because Hitchcock was so known for like scenes with blinds and light coming off of blinds maybe maybe that's a good point okay so the last thing I want to talk about is what do you think
It means that Henry cut the shroud off of his son, which was actually a part of his body, I guess, and then kills his son. What do you think about that? You know... i go back and forth about the meaning of that you know is it some kind of like symbolic ego death is it a metaphor for death by suicide Is it some kind of metaphor for breaking oneself free from the sort of shackles of societal expectation?
You are the everyman. You had sex with the every girl. She's pregnant. Now you're married and parents and you've got this baby that you're shackled to as part of your every life. But if you kill the baby. maybe you are somehow freed of that it could be any of those things honestly to piggyback off of that do you think that henry was the dad or do you think the man in the moon
Was the dad. Well. I say that only based off of the markings that the man in the moon had versus the markings that the baby had when he was sick. I'm going to answer your question with another question. Okay. Is the man in the moon somebody separate or is the man in the moon somehow the soul or personification of the baby?
okay fair fair because the beginning is all about conception yeah you know that whole beginning montage so is the man in the moon the sort of grown ethereal representation of this baby that is yet to be born. Fair, fair. Doesn't matter. I mean, yeah, again, like it can it can be any of these things. Also, because we don't really know whether or not Henry actually.
killed the kid right because it appears to die there you know there's blood and gasping and it's it's very traumatic and then we see this gigantic version of the baby like the head is giant and it's just like you know there's flashing lights and henry's like oh you know he's obviously very scattered so we don't even know like does this really mean death or yeah is it like a metaphor
you know is there even a like is this even an actual conception of a thing or is it just an idea yeah yes and yes and exactly It's wild. It's a wild ride. It's an hour and a half, which is literally as much as I could possibly take from this movie. I am so glad that there's no more of this. It wasn't like a three hour long slog because I think Mulholland Drive is like...
2.30, 2.45 in terms of time. Yeah. So if this movie were that long, I would be like, look, I got to take a break. Like I got to tap for a second. But overall, I'm glad that I watched it. One of the most fascinating things to me about David Lynch is that he was deliberate. He wasn't concerned about winning accolades or awards. He wasn't concerned really about making money.
But he really appreciated all of the actors and people that he worked with. In fact, lots and lots of people. I'm sure you guys know. Kyle MacLachlan was in a shitload of his movies. Isabella Rossellini, not only was she in a bunch of his movies, she also was his partner for several years. He would kind of reuse the same cadre of actors. Laura Dern, who not only is Laura Dern in a lot of Lynch movies,
She also went on to have her own career in, you know, in like more traditional movies, a.k.a. Jurassic Park. Yeah. The least... lynchian movie of all time the polar opposite yes yes but also with little lizard baby things so she was familiar then yes yeah But he was very well respected as a director and writer who took care of the people that he worked with, which I think is something that unfortunately is a dime a dozen now, or not a dime a dozen, I guess the opposite of that. And he...
live this sort of almost monk-like lifestyle to allow his creative brain to take over. Yeah, not to go off on a total tangent here, but... He reminds me of Leonard Cohen in that way, who was a literal monk at one point in his life. But there is a similarity and a through line there for sure. Yeah. Eating the same thing every day so that he could. So he didn't have to concentrate on the mundanity of real life. Yeah. So he could exist in these other worlds, sometimes to his own pain.
To live entirely there. And another thing that I love is that he would get so finicky about these details that other people would never bother themselves with. But then other things would happen in the scene. He'd be like, no, let it ride. Just let that go. So what he found important is very fascinating to me. Yeah, absolutely. Well, I mean, and that is. to me, the sign of a truly great auteur that you have a vision that you are committed to and you're being very intentional.
But you're also not so intentional that you are not allowing the magic of collaboration that happens in movies. to be lost like that you are you're open to that as well because there are plenty of directors that are notoriously so intentional that they don't allow for those moments of spontaneity and of kind of movie magic when a scene just comes together in a beautiful and organic way. And the fact that he was open to that while also being so true to his own vision is really a testament.
you know i i don't want to say ideal but like the the kind of ideal of an artist that you can have both and yeah One last thing I want to say about David Lynch, because I don't know if we're going to do another David Lynch movie, probably not anytime soon. But Twin Peaks was the first thing I ever watched of his. I found it intoxicating. I found it like I was obsessed. I didn't understand.
stand, but I didn't have to, because I was like, this is the most perverse, amazing, horrific soap opera that I could possibly imagine. It's kind of amazing that they allowed that on television. Absolutely. You know, like dead girl. Yeah. Weird, you know, sexual club that's happening between underage girls and and yeah. overage men yeah it is wild that they allowed it on tv it's obvious why it got canceled it got to be too much like people were like holy shit we can't
Like Sherrilyn Fenn is too hot for TV. We can't do it anymore. But Lynch actually plays a character within, you know, his own work, which I think is... funny and fantastic. And it's a goofy character, Agent Cole, who is sort of the boss of Kyle MacLachlan's character. And he is funny in the way that he has like these two hearing aids, but he still yells all the time.
which is an affect of his character, except for when Shelley talks, then he can hear her perfectly, which he specifically wrote those scenes so that he could kiss her. Yes. Which I think is kind of weird, but it's okay. It's Dave Lynch, so it's fine. Everybody's okay. But... I want to talk about a scene where he's talking to, and another reason why I love this series is that David Duchovny is in it, right? And he plays a character called Denise, who is trans and has made the transition.
And I wanted to say this quote because I don't know if we're ever going to be able to say it. He and Denise are having a conversation. Cole and Denise are having a conversation. Denise has left and come back as a consultant. And David Lynch says, I had enough dirt on you to fill the Grand Canyon and I never used a spoonful because you are a great agent. And when you became Denise, I told all your colleagues, those clown comics to fix their hearts or die. Yes.
And as I've said many times before, Gordon, I can never repay you enough for that kindness. So that's what Denise says back to. So I think it is absolutely incredible that a television show that came out in the early 90s by. Someone who everybody thought was quote unquote weird that got a huge following. This TV show did even by people who weren't watching David Lynch's movies. Otherwise, he used that as a platform to say.
fix your hearts or die. And I love that so much. Like, I thought about that after he died, like... What a way to put himself out on a limb and say trans people are who they say they are. And there is no question about that at all. And David Lynch was very much a like.
I think he never really pontificated much on it outside of this, but he is absolutely the type of person that I would imagine would be like, why are we even... talking about exactly like why is this not already an assumed yes baseline yes so I love that. It's my favorite quote in all of Twin Peaks. Fix your hearts or die. I love that. And I was like, I'm going to take this as an opportunity to say it because I don't know when we're going to have another chance to talk about.
david lynch yeah we've seen that quote re-emerge a lot both because it is extraordinarily timely and in light of his death and it is uh It's such a simple and powerful directive. It says everything it needs to. Absolutely. And so that's what I wanted to leave this episode with. David Lynch's legacy being don't.
think too hard about weird movies because they can just be weird and they don't have to mean anything and you don't have to know what they mean and also fix your hearts or die because those are your options yep you don't have another option like there is nothing else to talk about fix your heart or die and I'm like yes that's perfect exactly what is the next movie that we're watching because I don't think I know what this movie is oh okay
Okay, so for our next movie, we are moving into the world of the more literal. We are going to watch one of the sort of... Prototypes of Italian Giallo, Mario Bava's 1964 movie Blood and Black Lace. So this is considered... One of the earliest best examples of Jallo, it really set the stage for everything that was to come. Mario Bava, obviously.
icon of cinema who influenced a whole generation of peers and European directors to follow. So we're going to do that one next. Well, I love Mario Bava, so I'm excited. Thanks for listening to attack of the final girls. Find us online at attack of the final girls.com and hear bonus episodes at patrion.com slash attack of the final girls.
We're Attack of the Final Girls on Instagram and TikTok. Our theme music is by House Coast and is available on Rad Girlfriend Records. Be sure to subscribe on your favorite podcasting app so you don't miss an episode. And rate and review on Apple Podcasts so more... where people can find the show. I'm Juliet. And I'm Teresa. Until next time, stay scary.